Page:Seven Years in South Africa v2.djvu/103

  Senegalensis) wheeling in circles over the stream, on the look-out for some of the fishes that hid themselves under the stones in the shallow salt-pools. I stooped down so as not to startle them, and had the good luck to secure both the birds for my collection.

In the afternoon I took a much longer walk, crossing the plain to the south, curious both to see the quarters of the Matabele people and to inspect the place where they obtained their salt. About three-quarters of a mile from the waggons, we startled a herd of zebras, of the dark species; so impetuous was their flight that I quite expected to see them all dash headlong over the steep bank, but they suddenly stayed their course and turned off short into a narrow rain-channel; they raised a great cloud of dust as they scampered down into the river-bed, whence they clambered up again on the other side where the bank was less steep. On account of the great size of their head and neck they look much larger at a distance than they really are; the peculiar noise they make, “ouag-ga, ouag-ga,” the last syllable very much prolonged, has caused both the Masarwas and the Makalaharis to call them quaggas.

When we got near the quarters of the Matabele gang, I thought it needful to take care that we should be unobserved. In the open plain of course there was nothing to cover our approach, and I turned into the bed of a side-stream that I reckoned would take us in the right direction. I supposed this to be a branch of the Nata leading to the Soa, along which I proposed to go for a mile or so, and then turn off, but we had not proceeded very